TheBrownBottle

They'll go up, but their presence in the Third Division has provided non-stop laughter for me. Fuck knows why Netflix paid Chappelle and Gervais so much for some nondescript stand-up; Sunderland Til I Die is still the funniest thing I've seen on telly for years. Better than its prequel, Premier Passions, though to be fair watching Peter Reid swear at shite sunderland players will always be entertaining. Always worth remembering that being in the Second Division still represents failure, not success - and given the parlous state of their finances, relegation will remain their most likely exit route from that division. Fulham's wage bill alone is like six times sunderland's turnover ...

Was just thinking of him - though I suspect it was just that one game (tbf, from memory he had a few canny games vs us. Including our first 0-0 in something like 70-odd games)

Not the worst player I’ve ever seen, but Pahars scored in something like five or six consecutive games against us for Southampton and looked like a world-beater, despite being the most Southampton-y player ever (mediocre but not useless, scented blood vs Newcastle)

Mick Harford scored a lot of winners & equalisers against us, despite being a useless Mackem pile of shite

David Speedie (c***)

10th (or above) next season, with not a single thought at any point re relegation, would represent proper progress for me. A decent cup run would also be great, as it would start to kill off some of the worst memories of a decade and a half of deliberate no-shows in the cups - but it wouldn’t be something that I’d judge the season on.

It’s a reminder of just how well Howe has done to get the results he has out of this group of players. It also shows you just how much they’ve played out of their skins - but the Spurs and Man City away games (and Liverpool at home if we’re being honest should’ve been a similar score line) are evidence that we’re light years away at present in terms of quality.

I think Wood has served his purpose well enough - he added a bit of experience and strength up top. He’s far from a great finisher, but I think he is a better CF than Gayle, and his contribution in keeping us up shouldn’t be over- nor underplayed. £25m was a lot of money for him, but he’s helped keep us up. If we can get close to half back in the summer then it was a decent deal for me.

Trippier is the only defender at the club who’d be part of any remotely ambitious set-up medium-term; but we’re a long way from being competitive Dubravka, Burn, Targett, and Schaar are bottom-half of PL quality (though much better than relegation fodder). I’d hope to have them all replaced/sitting as squad players within 12-18 months if we’re going anywhere. Personally I think Dubravka’s replacing is more urgent than others may think - his distribution is woeful and invites pressure, and his decision-making is questionable. He also has at least one clanger per game in him. A better quality keeper would be a priority for me - though if the reports on the budget are accurate, that might be tricky as it wouldn’t be as great a need as the forward positions. A top notch defensive midfielder wouldn’t go amiss either - though I do think DM is now Joelinton’s best position (the talk of him being a ‘number 8’ worries me - the lad is hopeless in attacking positions; but he’s strong and tenacious and decent technically, and pretty good at reading the game - what you’d want from a DM).

Sports laundering I think they call it over there. Or at least the Glazers do.

Beat Man City; which scouse club does what doesn’t bother me, but winning away at Man City would be fantastic for confidence and would be far more memorable

I don’t have much time for the ‘American sports are shite’ arguments (don’t watch them myself, but there’s loads of things I’m not interested in - doesn’t mean that they’re shit). But the Bury argument wouldn’t hold water in terms of extolling the wonders of US sports administration - a place the size of Bury wouldn’t have a club that would ever be able to potential compete in the ‘majors’. Greater Manchester would likely have a franchise based on the size of the population (and market potential). Bury’s sad demise wouldn’t have happened in US sports, primarily because Bury would be unlikely to have a professional team which had an opportunity to one day compete in the ‘majors’ in the first place. And therein lies the big difference, for me. European clubs - not just English ones - represent the locality. They are social hubs, where an expression of civic pride / coming together happens - clubs are completely tribal. That’s why people who support a club to which they have no connection other than the fact they saw them win a lot on TV when they were kids are sneered at - quite apart from anything else, they undermine the entire fabric of the game. The existence of those ‘fans’ are why local sporting institutions like football clubs now sell for stupid money. To most supporters who actually attend, ‘fan experiences’, shiny merchandise, etc are utterly meaningless because the pleasure comes from a tribal sense of togetherness, not because the club shop has shiny trinkets. Some of the best fan ‘experiences’ I’ve had have been in crumbling shitholes. Some of the worst in shiny superdomes. You’re in the place for a couple of hours, the vast majority of which is spent staring at a green rectangle. I’ve rarely been arsed about the fact that the half time bar is decked out to the standards normally reserved for upmarket restaurants. The tribal thing is why clubs in English football’s fourth tier can pull five-figure attendances. That’s how several clubs who have literally won nowt - ever - and don’t even have large supporter bases (Watford, Palace, Brentford etc) can be in the ‘majors’ whilst huge clubs with great histories and sizeable catchment areas can languish outside of it. The US is so culturally different, yet because it is anglophone many assume it is somehow more alike. I’d no sooner want to adopt the US sports model in the UK than I’d expect to tell the average American how they should change their sporting institutions. I fundamentally don’t understand it, and it isn’t really any of my business. I don’t personally think American owners / directors are any more likely to sign up to nonsense like ESL (though I don’t doubt they’d see a ‘logic’ to it); Arsenal, Juve, Barcelona, Spurs, Real, Man City etc were only too happy to hop-on despite having very different ownership models. Truth is, the influx in money to the game has meant the continual pressure to ‘improve’ things which don’t need improving because the money dictates it (more CL games, more CL places, too much input from TV companies etc) - and that’s not an ‘American’ thing, it’s a capitalist thing. For the first century or so of its existence, football clubs weren’t actually allowed to even pay dividends, per FA rules. Money & greed are the issue.

From memory, Batty was in the running for the vote for ‘player of the season’ in 95/96 in The Mag. Can’t remember if he won or was just top three - but considering he was only bought in March … the idea that Batty somehow changed the play style is puzzling. He was the best player in a B&W strip on his debut vs Man Utd at home, and was that in most of the remaining games. Batty was a superb defensive midfielder. He only started going backwards (literally) towards the end of his time here - though he was excellent at Leeds again afterwards. Comfortably the best defensive midfielder the club has had in my lifetime, and a marked improvement on Clarky in the centre.

That was during that bizarre run where we didn't win away at the Smoggies for about 40 years - I'm sure someone will know the actual number

I like everything being back to how it should be - sunderland being a broiling, jealousy-fueled, spite-spitting powder keg; and us laughing our [insert appropriate body part here] off at the soppy sods. Like a playground bully holding a smaller kid back by simply pressing an open hand against the top of his head, laughing while the smaller kid swings again and again and doesn't land a single blow. Fantastic.

I was in Majorca when we signed him - talked to a local in a bar that morning who reckoned he was excellent, and was thoroughly depressed that he'd went. Looking back, hard to tell if he was taking the piss!

Has to be said, I loathe MK Dons - a different kind of loathing to SAFC, but loathing nonetheless. Wish the Mackems had them in the semis, as I think they’d put the Mackems out - before hopefully losing themselves in the final.

Worst signings relative to cost are still Marcelino, Luque and Boumsong for me - though I’m happy to nod in agreement with plenty of others.

Yeah, doesn’t make a lick of sense. I agree with Tsunami - it is likely that plenty of southern clubs voted for Peterborough, and the northern vote was largely split between four clubs (Gateshead did still get 18 votes), they were just unlucky. Had it been two years earlier, before the Division 3 N/S reform into Div 3 & Div 4 they’d have been ok in all likelihood

Southport, Oldham and Hartlepool were three of the four clubs re-elected - with Peterborough elected in Gateshead’s place. So while it is a reasonable assumption that southern clubs favoured Peterborough, it can’t be said that it was a conspiracy - Gateshead were unlucky in that four of the five clubs who finished top in the league election that year were northern.

Gateshead finished 5th in the 1960 re-election vote to the league - only the top four were re-elected in these annual votes. The thing is, Gateshead were 11 votes behind Southport - so even if NUFC didn't vote for them (and there is no record of who voted for whom - and note that you didn't vote teams out, you voted them in), it was hardly the decisive vote. More mackem conspiracy theories. Newcastle United had the some of the highest average crowds in the country on average in the 50s - why would Gateshead / South Shields even have been deemed a threat? I bet every social club in sunderland has heard this 'fact' farted out at least once a night for sixty years, mind.

Mackems tend to be obsessed with pulling %s out of their arse for the NUFC/SAFC make-up of anywhere from the Tweed to the Tees outside of Newcastle and Sunderland themselves. Obviously Gateshead will have mackems living there, and some who support both - but the idea that it would be a significant chunk is laughable. Traditionally, it made more sense once you're getting towards 'Jarra', but the %s were always pulled out of their arses. Even deepest darkest Durham never seemed quite as 'mackemy' as they loved to claim. Give it a decade or so, and those numbers will dwindle even further. Anyone who was around in the '90s saw it.

ASM isn't as good as he thinks he is, but he is better than his current performances suggest. I don't doubt that with better players he'd be better - but that's applicable to everyone. Those comments are pure knobheaddery, mind. Have to say, unlike the previous 14 years, I wouldn't be too upset about any player leaving at any time - namely because I'd know it was the manager's call, and not just an accounting decision. Ambitious clubs still sell players, even good ones, if they aren't the right fit or a better option is available. Under Ashley, selling ASM would have just been about the bottom line.

I love all the displays and flags Wor Flags do - but the giant surfer is marvelous, just from a sentimental / nostalgia POV re Keith Barrett's surfer flags in the 90s

Chelsea lose money hand-over-fist. They aren't financially viable - they're a financial black hole. They require a sugar daddy to stop them from folding. I don't follow the logic of a club losing 100m in one year being viable because they're turning over 300m.